


the heat lifts you faster

by Magpied_Spider



Series: Children shall not be put to death for the sins of their father [1]
Category: Sky High (2005)
Genre: Gen, I refuse to believe that baron battle is his legal name but that's an argument for another day, What kind of classes do they have at this school anyway?, don't talk to warren about his father, mentions of the last two characters listed but they're important so, polyglot warren peace, warren peace is a massive nerd FIGHT ME
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-06
Updated: 2016-01-06
Packaged: 2018-05-12 04:52:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,012
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5653123
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Magpied_Spider/pseuds/Magpied_Spider
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Warren Peace is not having a good day.<br/>(A look at why the soft-spoken, thoughtful waiter at the Paper Lantern would destroy half the cafeteria because a freshman mentioned his father.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	the heat lifts you faster

**Author's Note:**

> Title from A Softer World 1137: forget the crying child / imagine how it must feel / to be that balloon floating away (burn everything, the heat lifts you faster)

Warren Peace was, _is_ , not having what you might call a good day.

He’d had a later-than-usual night at the Paper Lantern – and he’s counting this as part of today because it had gone well into the hours of the morning – meaning that first-period World Literature, the only class he really felt welcomed in, was an absolute jumble, his brain hardly able to keep the English straight in his mind. He’d tried to get a pen off Freeze Girl in Cantonese, then five minutes before the end of the lesson realized that half his essay on _Crime and Punishment_ was in Cyrillic.

Not Russian. Just English written in the wrong alphabet. He’d had to hand it in with an awkward disclaimer, but the Ms Freeburn reminded him as to why she was his favorite teacher by pointing out that it wasn’t being graded, and she could use some mental gymnastics.

“This is _world_ literature, Warren,” she’d said. “It’s not being graded, but I’m just going to throw it out there that if you _were_ to write your final essay using Russian quotes instead of the translation we’re using, you’d be free to do so.” She paused. “And while I don’t speak it myself, if it is just the wrong alphabet like you say, I’ll have something to occupy my time if my husband’s done the crossword before I have a chance to look at it.”

Mad Science with Mr. Medulla was always a chore, but they had a substitute teacher, and his accent was _unbelievably_ thick – and it wasn’t something that he’d be able to complain about to his lab partner, who was away sick, because it wasn’t even a foreign accent, just from somewhere in the South.

But with English only loaded up 70% in his brain if he was being generous to himself, the weird preterits and double modals were making his head hurt enough that he didn’t even realize his fake-bomb’s timer had started ticking down until it stuck out a flag with “boom!” written on it.

“Mister Peace, I’m disappointed _,”_ Doctor Jenkins drawled, walking past his table. “I knowed your father, he been one of my best students.”

Warren _didn’t_ set his notes on fire with an ill-timed flame, instead, he gritted his teeth, and said, in as unaffected a voice as he could, “Sorry, sir. I think I matched up the wrong manual for this model.”

Doctor Jenkins shook his head ruefully. “He used to could have done some great things, you know.”

Was this guy deliberately trying to bait him? He might be: as a substitute, he didn’t have to answer to anyone, and he was the only living Super available and qualified to teach, so it wouldn’t matter if anyone made a complaint, he’d be back the next time there was an absence.

If he wasn’t, then he was much more stupid than Warren would think a teacher at Sky High could be – there were some things that you just _don’t talk about_ , and a “supervillain” for a father would be pretty high up on the list.

Either way, there were some things that would never fail to bait Warren, and making light of the deeds of his father were one of them. Because everyone knew about Baron Battle, the husband of a superhero and a villain so complete that no one spoke about his deeds in polite company. They knew about his son, the pyrokinetic, and they never failed to let said son know that they knew.

They knew _nothing_.

They didn’t know that his mother had gone to pieces and he’d been mostly living with his grandmother since he was seven. They didn’t know that for so many years of his life he’d been unable to _understand_ that his father – the man who’d made it snow for Christmas, who’d tucked him into bed and acted out the stories with watery figurines, who’d cook dinner for his mother when she was out late and who’d worn his UHU uniform with pride – was one of the people that heroes fought against.

And chances were, they didn’t know that the _reason_ people didn’t ever discuss his crimes was because he knew how the game between heroes and villains was meant to work, and threw the rule-book out the window: he’d killed and made it look like an accident, he’d hidden his powers and greeted the police that came after him with icy floors and spikes through the neck, he’d have a remote detonator as well as a timer and if it looked as if a bomb was going to be disarmed he’d explode it then and there.

They didn’t care; they just knew that Warren’s father had been full of promise, and then that he’d become a villain, only to be brought to justice by the Commander. _Justice._ Ha. At least four of the murder convictions should have been manslaughter, that much was clear to anyone who so much as read the newspaper, much less served on the jury.

Damn it, Warren was _tired_ , he was tired of people assuming they knew who he was, that they knew who his _father_ was, but most of all, he was tired because he’d had maybe four hours of sleep last night, and he was reaching the end of his tether.

 _Could have done some great things his_ ass, his father _had_ done some great things and it’s times like this that Warren really feels like burning something, and when there’s nothing more than paper that he needs available, that feeling just burrows inside him and smolders.

It’s that feeling that overrides his brain-to-mouth filter, and before he knows it, he’s replying. “Like stopping an entire city from flooding, for instance?”

He realized a moment later that one of those strange full-room silences had fallen, and every person in the class had heard him. “Like saving twelve hostages and taking out a villain who’d’ve leveled the city?”

Warren wasn’t by nature someone who gave impassioned, meaningful speeches, and he was feeling every eye from his fellows. He tried not to put his foot in his mouth, and round it out, like Ms Freeburn always said. _Rules of three._ “Like lobbying for legislation to be put through so the press wasn’t allowed to badger every super they found for every waking moment of their lives?”

Ironically enough, if that legislation _hadn’t_ been put through, the Commander would probably have been delayed enough for his father to have escaped. Warren pressed on. “Don’t…” he took a breath, made sure not to clench his fists too tight. “Don’t talk about my father. Not like he never did a good day’s work in his life.”

Dr Jenkins looked a little taken aback, but nodded, then looked around the room. “What’re y’all starin’ at? Y’all’ve got work.”  
The students’ gaze drifted back to their own tables, and Warren let out a slow breath through his nose.

Four hours of sleep, but he’d managed not to set anything on fire yet, so. Could be worse.

“Sorry,” Dr. Jenkins said, softer. He looked as if he was about to go and pat Warren’s shoulder, but thought the better of it, and moved on to berate the next table about their wire-cutting technique.

Warren debated whether he should try and snatch a snooze in the library during the morning break or dose up on some caffeine.

Strong in the knowledge that naps often make you _more_ tired, he grabbed an iced coffee from the vending machine, grabbed the mug he kept in his locker, and heated himself up something to stop him from conking out in the middle of PE.

It’s just regular PE, not the once-a-month _Save the Citizen_ that the whole school has to attend despite it only featuring four students at a time, and for that Warren was grateful, but he’s not huge on the hand-eye co-ordination today, and seems to be more effective at burning the targets to a cinder than punching small bull’s-eyes.

“Hothead!” Coach Boomer yelled, “Control yourself! Fine movements are—“

 _More important than the big ones, sometimes_ , Warren remembered his father saying. _You don’t need to bash a door down if you can break the lock._

“—Just as important as power. Grab another target and go again.”

Lugging the target back to its point, Warren closed his eyes, willed himself to not fall asleep on his feet – he was quite literally burning through the caffeine – and tried to work out how small a flame had to be for it to reach the target without fizzing out, as a distraction from the fact that if the school were to start to burn down right now, he’d only care because wildfires like that are a better pick-me-up than the half-strength former-iced coffee that you can get from the vending machine.

It doesn’t have the same effect if you start the fire yourself, though, so Warren gritted his teeth and alternated between his left and right hands, shrinking the flame until there was almost nothing left.

The answer, it turned out, was the size of a quarter. Warren had half a mind to check after he’d had some more sleep whether that was a hard limit or if it was just his concentration, but then it was the end of the period, and he didn’t care that much, really.

Warren was pretty sure that the chemistry teacher didn’t care if half the class was asleep, so long as they weren’t eating in the classroom, but chances were that he’d be the last drop to overflow the teacher’s patience-filled cup, so he kept his head up and used the red pen he’d found on the floor to draw flames on his wrists.

Heroes might not get much input in the costume department any more, but he’d want something like that, provided that the UHU could overlook the existence of his father enough to offer him a placement.

He was looking forward to math after lunch – at least the numbers stay the same when his brain won’t – and sat down with his tray and a book at his usual spot.

Warren pus his head down, turning to his bookmark, and filters out the English babble around him as he falls back into the words of Lermontov.

There’s a shout a bit closer than he’d like, and a moment later something hits the side of his head.

There’s a _ka-thump_ as his assailant hits the ground, and Warren takes a moment to appreciate that at least there isn’t sauce on his book, before getting up to see who it is.

He lets the bad mood that’s been building all day boil over, as he turns as menacingly as he can to see who it was.

And, oh, isn’t that the icing on the cake? It’s the Stronghold kid he’s been pointedly not listening to rumors about – decked out in red, white, and blue, assured of a place in his dynasty even when he’s got no powers to speak of.

“Sorry,” the guy says half-heartedly, and Warren's not going to let this slide, not any more.

“You _will be_ ,” Warren replies, getting up in the freshman’s space – and wow, he can’t be more than a year or two older than Stronghold, but he’s got a height advantage and he’s going to use it.

And Stronghold _smiles_ , and he says, “Let’s not do this,” as if he has the right to direct where this conversation is going to go after _dumping his lunch on Warren’s head_ , jut because his red-white-and-blue-stained surname let him _have_ those assumptions.

Warren is not going to take this. “You think you can do whatever you want just because your name’s _Stronghold_?” He’s turning up the intimidation now, because he just wants the guy to go away and leave him alone, but he’s starting to worry in the back of his mind – the bit that governs rational thought, and is so sleep-deprived that it’s lost almost all functioning – that he won’t be able to bow out gracefully even if Stronghold _does_ acquiesce, apologize properly, and leave.

Except instead of acknowledging his privilege in life, Stronghold’s putting on some sort of weird, put-upon voice, and saying “I’m sorry that my dad put your dad in jail—“ And that’s it.

That’s the breaking point, because this kid has _no idea_ what he’s talking about.

“No-one talks to me about _my_ father,” Warren growls, grabbing at the kid’s collar and pulling him up.

His hand flares, and honestly Warren wouldn’t have noticed if Stronghold hadn’t grunted in pain, so he lets him go, his emotions running high, incandescent with the thought that the kid who ruined half his life was presuming to _know him_.

The rest of the cafeteria’s ground to a halt, clearing the area, and Warren’s fire is not going to die.

The flames spread to his forearms, and the kid looks astonished that anyone would even power up outside of the gym, but Warren doesn’t care about that.

He’s had a long day, and he’s not going to let one more person who has no idea of what they’re talking about dictate their interactions.

The bit of his brain in charge of impulse control is screaming that this is a terrible idea, but the students are chanting _fight, fight_ , and Warren just wants to let loose, because _fuck_ fine control, sometimes smashing the door down is good enough.

He throws a fireball at the kid – it won’t do much, it’s not hugely hot, and most of the kids have their toughness secondary manifest long before their primary – and it melts the cheap plastic they use for lunch trays.

He throws another, making it flare as a reminder for the now-gathered crowd to stay out of the fight, and Stronghold ducks out of the way. It hits the kitchen, which is mostly fireproofed, and he reminds himself that he doesn’t want to kill the kid.

Just scare him off, and remind the rest of the school why it’s a bad idea to bother him while he’s at it.

Left, right, left, right, he aims to the side of Stronghold, still hitting the kitchen, and the kid does well to dodge before seeming to forget that there are other people in the cafeteria and running for the side.

Warren throws another fireball, but the kid dodges it by virtue of tripping over his own feet. He lets the crowd clear as he walks over, looks Stronghold in the eyes, and lets the flames creep up his jacket arms – the shirt’s short-sleeved, and the leather wasn’t going to burn.

The guy’s crawling under a table now, rather than standing to fight – don’t they teach sidekicks anything? He remembers in _his_ freshman year being taught how to defend yourself without using your powers by the second week.

No teachers have come out to neutralize the fight yet, and the small part of Warren’s brain that gets concerned with these kinds of things feels a twinge of worry – what would happen if someone _actually_ tried to kill another student?

He starts hurling fireballs to the side of the table instead, keeping Stronghold in the corridor he’s created for himself, and keeping the circle around them from getting smaller.

They reach the end of the table, and he feels his rage flare up again – who does this guy think he is, that he can dump his lunch on Warren’s head, then make light of his father’s deeds? A Stronghold, that’s who he thinks he is, and he’s not wrong.

“Where’re your sidekicks, Sidekick?” Warren asks, and he’s not expecting a response, but he gets one – a whole posse of them, actually.

“Right here!” One of them says – the tall one, with the blond hair and propensity for neon. He seems to be the leader, by virtue of him being the one moving closest to Warren, but the others are close – it’s more likely that they’re all Stronghold’s sycophants and this is just how they happened to be sitting.

“Yeah!” The short black kid agrees.

It’d be sweet if the only thing on his mind right now wasn’t fire.

They have no part in this fight, and he lights up to his shoulders, giving half a roar to make his point, bringing his hands up as if he were about to throw a huge flame at them.

The black kid melts – what a _weird_ power – and Warren hears the voice of Stronghold, from still under the table, saying “Leave them alone!”

And then the table’s wobbling underneath him, and hello, hello, Stronghold lives up to his family name again.

Well, that was expected, honestly – super-strength tends to carry through families, whereas people like him tend to be a bit more of a mixed bag.

Some of his fire goes out, retreating to his hands, as he keeps his balance on the rising table, before winking out as he goes hurtling through the air.

 _Well,_ the fair part of Warren’s brain concedes, even as he hits something on the ceiling that’s probably vital for the structure of the building, _at least it’s a fair fight now._

Warren hasn’t been picked for Save the Citizen since Boomer decided to forgo the traditional names-out-of-a-hat method and instead elected to just let Speed and Lash pick their victims, so he hasn’t had much chance to use his powers at full pelt.

But now, safe in the knowledge that he won’t hurt the kid permanently, and with the majority of his brain still a roaring combination of _angry_ tired _sickofthis_ whodoyouthinkyouare _,_ Warren crashes into the table, hears the crowd cheering for the guy who’s defeated someone a grade his senior, and decides, fuck this.

They’ve already destroyed school property, everything from here on in is window dressing, so he calls out, “Stronghold!” as he clambers out of the wrecked table.

His cup has overflowed, and it’s full of oil, and he’s going to burn something to the ground.

Warren lights up his sleeves, letting his hair fall in a way that he _knows_ is intimidating, and stares the kid down.

He raises his fists in what seems to be a parody of a boxing set-up, and Warren can’t believe that this kid really thinks the world works like a match, with rules and guidelines and honorable players, so he starts running at him.

Well, what do you know, they _do_ teach them something in Sidekick class, because Stronghold hurls him through a wall and into a pillar; Warren clambers out, hearing the cheering of the cafeteria’s populace, and wonders for the first time if what he’s always called the “toughness secondary” that most heroes seem to have is a phenomenon that’s unique to his – his father’s – no, _his_ family.

And it’s that thought that fuels him, the thought that something he’s taken for granted might have been a final gift from his dad after, that lets him clamber out of the concrete as if it’s a crash mat, shout, “You think I can’t take a _hit_?”, and let this guy know once and for all that there are some lines you _do not cross_.

And the kid’s messing about with a fire extinguisher that someone’s chucked him – that would be a sidekick, they get specially trained to hand people things in times of stress – but he’s going to get there first unless he punches a hole in it—

Of course he does, the guy’s got newly-discovered super-strength.

Warren realizes that someone’s _finally_ called the principal when he goes to cough and doesn’t feel the usual burn – there’s a reason she can quiet a rowdy group of super-powered teenagers with a look, and that reason is that she’s a Neutralizer with an air of authority: to her, super-powered teenagers are no different to non-powered ones.

He doesn’t see her, but he sees Stronghold look contrite at someone over his shoulder.

They walk behind her without question, and without the burn of the fire inside, Warren just feels tired.

She lets them into a white room that reminds him, distantly, of a cell, and hears Stronghold protesting his innocence to the principal. “He started it,” Stronghold says, and Warren’s just going to say what he thinks now, because they destroyed the cafeteria and swearing isn’t going to make a difference to the punishment.

“Your _dad_ started it, and I’m going to finish it, you—“ he makes an aborted gesture to light up, muscle memory strong even in the knowledge of Powers’… powers, but it throws his exhausted brain just enough for a loop that he stops, because that wasn’t the principal, there was some kind of clicking.

He tries again, only to hear her say “Don’t bother. The detention room neutralizes all super powers. Sit.”

A room that neutralizes the powers of a Neutralizer, or a room that imitates their power? Either way, there’s no choice.

Warren sits, half-listening to the short lecture the principal starts giving – which sounds rehearsed. He half-wonders if she gives the same speech every detention.

“Living up to your father’s reputation, or trying to live it down,” _why does everyone think that his father was a one-dimensional evil-doer rather than someone who was doing what he thought was right, means to that end be damned,_ “—is a sad waste of talent. Your talent.”

She pauses, not long enough to actually give either of them a chance to turn the lecture into a discussion, just long enough to give that impression.

“Try to keep that in mind next time you’re about to do something stupid.” Principal Powers concludes, turning and walking out, her heels clack-clacking away.

Warren breathes out through his nose very, very slowly. He’s tired, but he’s not going to be able to sleep here; he’s still angry, but he knows that going out and incinerating something is going to be much more effective at diffusing that than sitting in this cell, stewing; he’s missing math. Mrs. Chen will be disappointed in him, and for some reason that makes him feel worse than all the lectures Principal Powers could give him put together. He stares up at the window in the door, hearing Stronghold sighing – and if the kid turns out to be one of those noisy breathers, he’s going to strangle him, powers or not.

“All right. Look,” Stronghold is saying, and Warren fights the urge to roll his eyes. It was the kid thinking he had some kind of influence over him that got them _into_ this whole mess in the first place. “Whatever happened with our dads, it has nothing to do with us.”

And it’d be a nice thought, if it were true.

Unfortunately, while Stronghold might have legitimately been completely unaffected by what happened between Warren’s father and Stronghold’s own, there was no way that Warren could ever let that lie: it was too much of his life.

Stronghold seemed to be completely sincere, though, and Warren – tired, annoyed, and with a cup that had overflowed and was now completely empty – didn’t give any acknowledgement of the statement.

 _If you ignore them_ , he thought distantly, thinking in a teacher’s voice, _they’ll go away_. But what did teachers know?

“What do you say?” Stronghold was offering his hand, he _thought it was a serious offer_ , and Warren didn’t have the energy or inclination to say something like, _have your dad disappear eight years ago and no one admit that he might have done something good even once in his life, have your mom shut down and still be a_ hero _but stop being a parent, have someone who’s had none of that pretend to understand you and then tell you to let it go because it doesn’t matter to_ them _, so why should it matter to you,_ then _tell me that the sins of the father are not laid upon the children._

Instead, he lets his tiredness show through in dead eyes, curls his lip, and says, “I say, if you ever cross me again, I’ll roast you alive.”

Distantly, he wonders if anyone picked up his book.

**Author's Note:**

> Warren is reading A Hero of Our Time by Mikhail Lermontov. A message played on the loudspeaker the next day, as follows: “A Russian book has been handed in to reception, would its owner please collect it by the end of the day. It’s in Russian.” (I assume all school announcements follow this kind of redundant description, as demonstrated by my school conductor: “Are there any girls that have lost a school blazer? It’s green.”)  
> If anyone who like… actually speaks or has experience with those who speak in a thick southern accent can give me (an Australian) any advice on Dr Jenkins’s speech, please speak up, I got all my grammar from Wikipedia.  
> My tumblr is rowingviolahere.tumblr.com, hit up my askbox and ask me to talk about my headcanons for Baron Battle, because I will talk all day. (For serious. I'm working on a fake wikipedia page about him, which will be posted as part of this series.)


End file.
